The present innovation pertains to managing a social network over a distributed network, and more particularly to optimizing distribution of queries to particular recipient members of the social network.
A social network service uses software to build online social networks for communities of people who share interests and activities or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most services are primarily web based and provide a collection of various ways for users to interact, such as chat, messaging, email, video, voice chat, file sharing, blogging, discussion groups, and so on. The main types of social networking services are those which contain directories of some categories, means to connect with friends (usually with self-description pages), and recommended systems linked to trust. Popular methods now combine many of these. There have been some attempts to standardize these services to avoid the need to duplicate entries of friends and interests, but this has led to some concerns about privacy.
Social networks connect people at low cost; this can be beneficial for entrepreneurs and small businesses looking to expand their contact base. These networks often act as a customer relationship management tool for companies selling products and services. Companies can also use social networks for advertising in the form of banners and text ads. Since businesses operate globally, social networks can make it easier to keep in touch with contacts around the world.
Social networks are beginning to be adopted by healthcare professionals as a means to manage institutional knowledge, disseminate peer to peer knowledge and to highlight individual physicians and institutions. The advantage of using a dedicated medical social networking site is that all the members are screened against the state licensing board list of practitioners. Several websites are beginning to tap into the power of the social networking model for social good. Such models may be highly successful for connecting otherwise fragmented industries and small organizations without the resources to reach a broader audience with interested and passionate users. Users benefit by interacting with a likeminded community and finding a channel for their energy and giving.
Using social networks to obtain information from individuals having a desired background, expertise and interests is challenging. If someone closely associated with the individual had the needed information, then the social network would not be necessary. However, the farther afield these informed individuals are from the individual with questions, the more difficult it is to encourage such communications. Either party may not trust the other. There may be no incentive for the informed person to participate in the communication. Responses may not be made in a timely fashion. Anonymity may undesirably implemented. Attempts to partially address these needs have been proposed or implemented, such as facilitating anonymous communication, creating a virtual system of favors for those who participate, determining a reputation of a participant, authenticating the identity of a participant, and facilitating communication between parties based upon social distance or defined relationships.